Overview
Program Intervention Assignment (Research/Advocacy Project)
Develop a 5-6 paged minimum original Research and Advocacy Project that will argue for an advocacy position on an issue of your own choosing built upon your lived experiences navigating various social institutions, use your knowledge of sociology and criminal justice as Praxis, and original research conducted through the sources provided.
Demonstrate the ability to harness the power of your experiences, educational advancements, and topic-specific research conducted to meaningfully address and improve a “social inequity of focus” (macro, meso, or micro-focused) of your choosing by creating a fictitious policy and or program targeting your social inequity of focus. Closely relate to local law enforcement as a desired career choice and communicate why and how you want to participate within this social realm/institution.
You will focus your program/intervention on either option below, depending on whether or not your are considered an “Internship Student” or are an “Alternate Pathway” student:
Develop a new program related to one of the major social institutions designed to ameliorate/address a social justice issue of your choice.
(Example Organization: School district. Example problem: Lack of wifi access for all students doing distance learning. Example Intervention: “Club WiFi” Take unused school buses and turn them into mobile Wi-Fi hotspots and park them in different zones across the school district on a rotating schedule that provides WiFi access coupled with lived experience youth mentors and tutors).
You must do the following:
1. Give the program a name and design a representative logo
a. The logo can be technology-generated or drawn, but must be original!
2. Explain and describe the internal organizational problem or the external social problem that your intervention will address. Give enough detail to explain what is happening and why it is a problem. Draw on the 2 scholarly, peer-reviewed, independently sourced sociological articles I included below.
b. Also reference all articles provided.
c. Explain and describe the structure of the program intervention.
Give enough detail here to understand who this program is for, who will run the program, what resources will be needed and included, how it will be facilitated, who’s labor will go into overseeing and running the program, what information or services will be provided, when it will occur, etc. If there is an information, training, or education component to your intervention, make sure to explain what that will include.
ii. In other words, consider addressing many of the following in this section: ? What would you like to see change or improve in society related to inequality, justice, and criminology and justice studies related
fields, institutions, and/or the policies, procedures, and practices
they perform?
? How did you come to your advocacy position? How does it relate
to you, your internship service, your research interests, and/or
your future career plans?
? For whom in particular might such changes and improvements
make a helpful difference?
? Where and when would such changes and improvements be
most/least effective?
? Why should institutions, organizations, policies, and practices -
and the people that influence them - have stakes in the changes
and improvements you propose?
? How should these changes and improvements take place?
? Who should be involved? Why?
? Where should this take place? Why?
3. Explain two projected outcomes of the program.
a. What are the potential benefits or positive impacts that instituting this intervention will bring?
i. Be detailed here and draw on the 2 sociological sources provided to support your argument. In the example above about mobile hotspots it would not be enough to merely say that a projected outcome would be
“increased access to Wi-Fi for low-income students.” I know that that will be an outcome because that is the intervention.
ii. take it a step further by making an argument about what outcomes that increased access to Wi-Fi might have for these students, drawing on existing research to support your argument (for instance,
there is research that demonstrates that consistent and stable access to Wi-Fi has significant impacts on k-12 student GPA, how mentoring
relationships are foundational for student learning and engagement, an inverse relationship with youth offense rates and/or recidivism, etc).
4. Consider and explain at least one potential barrier to developing your proposed program intervention. You do not have to come up with a solution to that barrier, but you can propose potential ways to overcome those barriers. Think sociologically about why there might be resistance to or constraints around your potential intervention. 5. Conclusion and Call to Action
a. You must not only “wrap-up” the contents of your paper in a methodical and well-organized manner, but you must also include an urgent, “call to action” positioning your suggestions for addressing the inequality of focus as vital in facilitating and advancing social justice efforts.
6. You must provide a Works Cited/Reference page for all the provided resources. In addition, you must provide in-text citations (ASA, MLA, APA formatting) every time you draw on these materials – either explicitly with a quote or implicitly by paraphrasing. See the documents/resources in the Final Project Module and Writing Resources Module in Canvas for help on formatting these citations and the structure/content of your paper overall.
Structure Breakdown
1. Program Name and Logo
? Creativity and originality of the program name
? Representation and relevance of the logo design
2. Problem Description and Sociological Support
? Clarity and depth of the problem description
? Integration of sociological sources to support the problem statement ? Relevance and recentness of sourced articles (2018-current)
3. Program Structure and Implementation
? Clarity and comprehensiveness of the program structure
? Identification of target audience and program beneficiaries
? Explanation of resources needed and facilitation process
? Consideration of labor and oversight for program execution
? Description of information, training, or education components
4. Justification and Advocacy Position
? Explanation of desired societal changes and improvements
? Connection between advocacy position and personal experiences, research interests, and career plans
? Identification of stakeholders and rationale for involvement
? Consideration of effectiveness, timing, and location of proposed changes 5. Projected Outcomes
? Detailed description of potential benefits or positive impacts of the intervention
? Integration of sociological sources to support projected outcomes 6. Barriers and Solutions
? Identification and explanation of at least one potential barrier
? Sociological analysis of resistance or constraints
? Proposal of potential ways to overcome barriers
7. Conclusion and Call to Action:
? Methodical and well-organized wrap-up of paper contents
? Inclusion of an urgent "call to action" for addressing educational inequality 8. Writing Mechanics and Citations:
? Adherence to ASA Style Reference for all academic sources
? Proper in-text citations following ASA formatting guidelines
Criteria
Program Name and Logo
Problem Description and Sociological Support
Program Structure and Implementation
Justification and Advocacy Position
Projected Outcomes
Barriers and Solutions
Conclusion and Call to Action
Writing Mechanics and Citations